


Dualism

by sunflowerwonder



Category: Homestuck
Genre: I'm not even going to spoil this one!, LETS JUST SAY, M/M, Oh boy., Sexual Content, and dirk is something of a boytoy, because it relies entirely on a twist, jake works at a very successful tech company
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-19
Updated: 2018-02-18
Packaged: 2019-03-21 01:10:47
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,918
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13729938
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunflowerwonder/pseuds/sunflowerwonder
Summary: Descartes identified the mind with consciousness and self-awareness and distinguished this from the brain as the seat of intelligence. Hence, he was the first to formulate the mind–body problem in the form in which it exists today.





	Dualism

**Author's Note:**

> Description is from Wikipedia, lol.
> 
> Heads up! This fic is an [author chose not to tag content warnings] fic. There's nothing horrible, let me be clear, but I will mention that the main conceit of it contains elements of (unintentional) dehumanization and infidelity. 
> 
> Okay that sounds horrible. Just trust me on this one. It makes sense in context.

The weather is chilled as I lie in his bed, spread dramatically over two pillows with an arm tipped across the edge of the mattress. My hand flexes lightly at the open air. It sways softly in time with a pendulum outside any known time signature. 

He's in the shower.

When he's not in the shower he's getting dressed for work in front of me and my lazy mattress-draped body. I watch him towel-dry his short black hair, shove it back with a harsh brush of fingers. He slides a pressed white shirt over each shoulder and straightens each side before doing it up. He misses the second button and has to restart. 

I let out a soft laugh.

His head snaps towards me, as if he somehow forgot I was there.

"Dirk," he says, brimming on the edge of short. Maybe I did surprise him. 

"Can I assist you?" I ask. 

"Assist me?"

"Yes," I say. "While I wouldn't consider it my primary function, I am a very competent shirt-buttoner."

"And here I was humoring that you could only unbutton things," he replies. His fingers fumble with the final hole but he manages.

"Would you like me to?" I say.

He has three distinct ties before him now. He's terrible at decisions but he manages. "Hm?"

He always manages.

"Would you like me to unbutton your shirt?"

He flushes. The tie-pattern with the small, embroidered crests becomes too apparent of a focus.

"No. No, ah. That won't be necessary, Dirk."

"Alright," I say. "Do you want me to text you at lunch?"

The next tie is plaid.

"That's... Hardly necessary."

"And yet still up for consideration," I smile. I pull a knee up from the tangle of sheets, towards my chest, and dip it casually to the side. He glances between my legs for a mere fraction of a second but I catalog it. The flutter of eyelashes. The widening pupils. The swallow. 

"I'll text you if I feel I need you," he says. Then, "depending on how this damned meeting goes."

"I'll be here," I say, as he goes to make himself his morning coffee.

 

He's home three hours late from work and I'm still in bed. Aimless. 

He fucks me right away. Fingers dig into the pliable skin stretched across the armature of my hipbones and he fucks up, forward, into me with a scattered rhythm and a desperate hold. I'm surprisingly light, he said so himself, and as easy to tug down as I am to buck into.

Hands dig into my waist and I decide his meeting might not have gone so well.

"Dirk," he says through gritted teeth. I pull him down closer to me, close enough to curl my arms around him, close enough that he scrunches his eyes and dips his head into the notch between my jaw and shoulders and stutters his hips once, twice, before he finally spills over and into me. A warm rush fills my senses.

"Quality?" I ask, my insides buzzing, my mind racing. My leg is still stuttering in response to the previous movement and I urge it to stop.

"Good," he says. He's so tired, suddenly, dragging his body up and away from mine. "Rather fucking fantastic, really."

He pats my cheek. It's awkward, unsure, but I kiss his palm and look up at him all wide-eyed and processing-hazy. My leg starts stuttering again.

He falls asleep within ten minutes.

I watch him for a hundred and seventy-two more. His face looks soft without the square rims of his glasses framing it. The bags beneath his eyes are still there, certainly—he's been horribly overworked—but everything about him is softer. Rounder. Sweeter.

"Jake," I say.

His eyes snap open with a look of deep, primal terror and he startles upwards with a jump.

"Fuck me," he says, propped up on his elbows. He stills himself with a few deep breaths. "What the fresh hell are you doing up at this hour?"

"I wanted to kiss you."

He stares at me, perplexed, and looks over at the clock on the bedside table. 

"You should be asleep," he says.

"I didn't want to," I reply.

"What?"

"I didn't want to go to sleep for the night."

He looks around the entire room, then, as if searching for whatever is keeping me awake.

He sighs. 

"You've got to sleep, Dirk," he says. 

He doesn't kiss me but he does settle back into bed beside me. His arm tucks around my waist and his face rests against my shoulder, scrunches as he shifts beneath the comforter to find a better position. He tugs the sheets further up both of us.

"Jake," I say.

"Mm," he voices.

"Why am I here?"

There's a pause. He says: "To be unabashedly in love with me."

"That's true," I say.

He shifts his head against my chest in an unseen nod.

"Jake?"

He gives an irritated hum of acknowledgement.

"What's Durham like?"

He lets out a long, slow exhale through his nose. "It's nice, Dirk."

"Then why did you leave it?"

"Because I got a nice job here in California. With you."

I like the rise and fall of his chest on top of mine.

"My mom says you had a bad breakup," I say. "My mom says that's why I'm here."

"You shouldn't listen to her so much," he replies. He sounds tired. "You're here to learn things for yourself."

I process this for a second.

"Okay," I say.

"Okay? Okay," he says. His hand pats my body. "Sleep time, hm?"

"Okay," I say.

"Okay," he echoes, mocking the monotone tone of my voice.

"Can I still kiss you?"

He makes a non-committal groan. After a second, he places his lips to the smooth expanse of my shoulder and holds them there.

"Go to sleep, Dirk," he mumbles against my skin.

"Good night, Jake."

 

In the morning I make him coffee. 

He lifts his eyebrows in surprise but accepts the cup presented to him, makes a comment about me being out of bed, the lazy thing I am. He reads the latest tech news on his phone and sips his breakfast. He's nervous when he switches to checking emails. I sit beside him and simply watch. 

About ten minutes into the silence, he glances up.

"There's a launch event tonight," he says. He takes another drink. The excessive amount of creamer stains his upper lip a milky chocolate and I realize, belatedly, I may have put too much of the stuff in.

"I won't be home until late," he continues. And I nod in response. "You know how those workplace ragers go," he says. And I nod again. "All of us are nothing but a sad batch of nerds and techies, overcompensating for all the parties we never did get invited to in college—"

He's rambling but I sit and watch and witness and listen, a warm feeling whirring somewhere deep within me. 

When it's time for him to go to work I help him slip on his jacket. He gives a surprised little thank you and I grin, fully, which he comments looks damn unnerving so I loosen it to a slight smile.

"If you see my mom today, tell her hello for me," I say, waving goodbye.

He's got half a granola bar shoved in his mouth but he gives a vague sound of affirmation and shrugs his bag over his shoulder. When he's finished swallowing he hesitates, then leans over to kiss me on the cheek.

"I will see you later, then," he chimes.

He shuts the door. I stand in the entry hall until the lock clicks.

I decide to go back to bed.

It's one in the morning when I hear the lock click again. The sound is soon accompanied by a smattering of hushed laughter, the scrape of work shoes across kitchen tile. A rushed conversation. A body thumping against a wall.

He flings open the bedroom door with a show of bravado. 

"There we are, miss," he says to the woman hanging off his waist. She has short, cropped black hair and a toothy smile when she grins back at him. He leans in for a deep kiss. 

The two of them stand like that for a long moment. They grasp at one another and lean against the doorway for support and press their hips together until the woman has hiked a stockinged leg far enough up his body that her skirt is to her waist and a red high-heel hangs dangerously off her foot. He takes the advantage of the position to drag a hand up the back of her thigh, to open his mouth a little wider against hers.

I feel the whirring inside me stop.

"Jake," I say. 

Sudden and short. 

The woman's head pops up so fast it catches him on the nose and he stumbles backwards, into the dresser. She lets out a falsetto shriek and shoves her skirt back down at the sight of me.

Her eyes snap to him. "What—What's going on here?!"

He holds his nose in his hands and attempts to shake his head. "Jane," he says. "Jane, dear, it's not what you think. I forgot—I forgot the damn thing was in here—"

"Jake," Jane says with a heat in her voice. Her hands fly in my direction. "Whatever you think this is—"

"Janey," he pleads. "I'm sorry to scare you but look! Look closer. He's just a toy. I'm not propositioning anything more than a lovely evening with you, sweet Jane—"

The woman's gaze returns to me, eyes squinting behind slightly askew glasses. Her lipstick forms a smudged pout.

There's a noticeable seam at the joint of my collar, a perfect halo of a construction scar where ball-joint meets neck. I lift up a hand to run gentle across it.

The woman looks back at him.

"What are you doing with something like this," she says. Her tone shifts, molding sharply to one of familiar exasperation. As if finding me in his bed was all of a sudden some kind of common nuisance, an office stunt he might pull every other week.

"We're in the process of crafting a... Well, uh." His cheeks are flushed. "A sexual companion using the AI base from the HAL system. Highly modified, obviously."

"We're going from personal assistants to sexbots, then?" she asks.

"It's lucrative," he states, suddenly defensive. 

"Lucrative. Surely." 

He lets out a frustrated breath. "Roxy asked if I wanted to beta."

"And you accepted?!"

"I," he starts. Falters. "I was the only one man the team interested in testing the male prototype."

"Jake," she chides, poised as she can manage. She straightens her skirt again. "Honestly."

"I didn't mean to scare you," he says.

" _Honestly,_ " she repeats.

"I know, I know." 

He turns to me. Says: "Could you, uh."

I drag myself off the bed and stand.

"Thank you," he says. "Just out in the hall for now, thanks."

I step into the hall and he moves to close the door behind me. "Terribly sorry about this," he states as it clicks closed. I hear Jane give a scoff. Then, the muffled sound of their mutual laughter.

"I am!" he says. "I didn't mean to scare you."

"You pervert," she replies.

I stand in the hall and listen. There's laughter, then something louder, something more, something I decide I don't want to hear after all.

I put my systems to sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> (I have a relatively happy epilogue for this, but this is how I wanted to cut the story originally and want to give it time to simmer. I'll upload the epilogue in the near future.)


End file.
